Rap artists are known for being tough, but that toughness doesn’t always help the people who wear it. You keep going. You don’t say anything. You get to work, do your job, and collect your pay. Whatever is going on in your body or mind stays there. The real name of NBA YoungBoy is Kentrell DeSean Gaulden. He seems to have taken that code more seriously than most people.
The 26-year-old rapper Funny Marco recently talked about something he had kept to himself for a long time on an episode of his podcast Open Thoughts. He was in the middle of his Make America Slime Again tour in 2025 when a doctor told him that the left side of his heart was swollen. He told her not to say anything and to finish the tour anyway. He said, “I never told anyone.” “I just kept doing every show.”
It’s hard to hear that without changing the way you listen to music. YoungBoy himself seemed to know that. After he said it, he made a half-joking comment about his songs, saying that the pain was already there, fans knew it or not. “But that makes sense of the music, right? “She’s in pain.” That line sounds more like an admission than a joke because it’s written with a tired tone.
The podcast was filmed in South Korea, which is an interesting fact in and of itself. After being released from 23 months in federal prison in 2025 because of gun-related charges by President Trump, Gaulden went to Korea for the first time and stayed there. He said the country was clean and safe, which aren’t words that usually come to mind when you think of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where he grew up. He said right away that he would move back to the United States when asked. Never in my life.
There wasn’t a hint of bitterness in the way he talked about Baton Rouge. Instead, it was like someone had closed a door and wasn’t interested in what was behind it anymore. “I used to always feel like I never had the opportunity to get away,” he stated. “It’s nothing there for me at all.” He said that he knew that his kids were still there. Still, it seems like he’s okay with being apart, at least for now.
The heart problem, which Gaulden says is still there to some extent, seems to be influencing some very careful choices about what to do next. He said that he was going to put out a few more albums. The next one, which is currently called All Dogs Go to Heaven, should come out before his October 20th birthday. Regarding touring, he made it clear that he plans to hit the road one last time and that will be the end of it.
That’s nine albums. Four of them made it to the top of the Billboard 200. That catalog wasn’t made by someone who was lazy. He might have been constantly putting out music and being around all the time, which could have had a cost that no one could see from the outside. The swollen heart doesn’t feel like something that happened all of a sudden. Instead, it feels like something that the body finally decided to say out loud.
It’s still not clear whether the diagnosis means formal treatment, a formal goodbye, or both. Gaulden has made it clear that he doesn’t want to act like something else anymore. Simple words were used to describe what was going on. That’s a statement in and of itself for someone who kept it to himself for a tour.
